Under the glass dome, like writhing, glowing worms, the numbers bend and fold as they change into new numbers. The digits are created by flexible neon tubes that are pushed and pulled by studs, displaying the hours and minutes. The clockwork behind, in addition to gears, has a generous supply of pulleys,
levers, cams and springs to reposition the studs.

This timekeeper, with a liberal mix of the old and new, pleasures with both its mechanical purr and its luminous display. You may even find yourself taking a pause from lunch to savor the shift from 11:59 to 12:00.

Neon Numbers at least...http://www.amug.org...omas/clockpage.htmlNumbers in neon, but no snakelike. They do seem to "move" from number to number due to depth. [oldvan, Oct 04 2004, last modified Oct 06 2004]

Do you even have a job, FJ, or do you just sit at home pushing your brain into new and exciting shapes, and live off the patent money from all your inventions (you must surely come up with 3 or 4 mundane but equally useful gizmos for every H/B gem)?

I wonder if there is some way, within the dome, to generate neon numbers without bending the beejeezus out of some tube.

The neon glows with current, and must conduct the current to some degree. If the dome were under vacuum, would it be possible to make the numbers by blowing neon gass through at high velocity (to the opposite portal where it would be sucked in) and send charge along the neon wind? The portals could shift along preprogrammed tracks, generating each number in turn. Wisps and trails of the unconfined gas would transiently branch off of the main stream, glowing momentarily. It would look like a fire.

What you need for this is not neon tubing but some sort of translucent dyed-plastomer spaghetti with a central light source, like those novelties they pass out at New Years Eve parties and such. Yeah, like that coolwire stuff, only a bit more flexible.

I kinda pictured it, before seeing the illustration, as having all the working innards contained inside the ropes themselves which would be just thick enough to contain a multi-jointed, programmable element, so that all you would see would be these freakishly living, coiling glowing snakelike thingys worming their way into number shapes.